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The religion of your choice

A response to political correctness in religion and an attempt at a rational and Biblical apologetic for the Christian revelation. Various world religions and the New Age are criticized as being man-made substitutes for God's truth made visible in Jesus Christ.

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality Quotes from Henry Ford:‚ People can have the Model T in any color – so long as it is black. ‚‚ History is more or less bunk.‛Is this or is this not a description of the modernWestern rejection of all authority or tradition ?

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityToday, instead of following stale dogma or dustytradition, you can:‚ Chose the beliefs that work best for you and the kindof reality you want to experience.‛ (p. 62)‚ . . . Each pagan [to] build his or her own personalspiritual philosophy.‛ (Ibid.)

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityI. Modernists are ‚not into religion but into ‘spirituality.’II. Characteristics of the Modernist Smorgasbord : A. Generally reject all doctrine, creeds, or tradition. B. What authority do they prefer in its place ? 1. Personal Experience. 2. An ‚inner voice‛ or the ‚God within.‛ 3. Religion is like a ‚menu‛ – ‚Preference – based‛ over a ‚truth – based‛ approach to matters of faith. 4. Selective syncretism: E.g., Some like Jesus’ ‚moral teachings‛ but His doctrines of hell and judgment.

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality Quote from George Barna Research Group:Barna indicated that the passing on of a Christian heritage fromone generation to the next appears to be rapidly dissipating inAmerica. "Our continuing research among teenagers andadolescents shows that the trend away from adopting biblicaltheology in favor of syncretic, culture-based theology isadvancing at full gallop.‚ 22‚ Americans Draw Theological Beliefs From Diverse Points of View, ‛http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=BarnaUpdate&BarnaUpdateID=122(accessed 12/2/08 ).

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityIII. The Idolatry of the Modernist Smorgasbord Making God in our own image (‚My Jesus‛). E.g. #1: Feminism & the ‚Goddess‛ – Rejection of God the Father (‚ An oppressive male Deity!‛) E.g., #2 : God as ‚ Parent, Child, and Spirit‛ or a highly re-interpreted ‚ Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier.”

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality Quote from Professor Paul Copan (p. 63):‚ Rather than adjust to God’s revelation, people may shapeGod into this or that image or impose their own experience.Yes, men have abused women, but this is a deviation fromtrue, divinely designed masculinity. And it’s precisely thefatherhood of God that must orient our understanding ofhow human fathers can and should act toward their children(Ephesians 3:15; 6:4; Ps. 103:13). ‚

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality V. The Son as a Model Father and Husband: As Professor Copan explains, ‚ the Son’s self-sacrificial love for his bride, the church, serves as a model for human marriage (Ephesians 5:25-32).‛ Why is this not a form of ‚ Divine child-abuse‛ (contra the feminists!) This expresses part of the truth of the relational triune God who ‚suffers with his creatures, and the Father and Spirit shared in the Son’s suffering . . .‛ (Paul Copan, Ibid.) How does 2 Corinthians 5:18-21 help us understand this Trinitarian relationality and special authority and revelation of the person of Jesus Christ ?

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityQuestion 1: How should compare a temporal loss of any or ourrelationships or possessions to a loss of the true God ?Question 2: Yet what is the cost of creating ‚our own God‛and ‚our own religion‛ ?Question 3: What did the Apostle Paul say about the cost ofdiscovering and pursuing the truth of Christ ? (Cf. Philippians3:7,8). Think about the cost of being a Christian in CommunistKorea, Red China, the Muslim Middle East, or . . . even in SanFrancisco ?

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality2. We Are Not God !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Only God can define true worship and, actually hehas ( Psalms 1; Micah 6:6-8; John 4:21-26; Romans12:1,2; Ephesians 5:1-7; James 1:22-27; and I John3:16 - 23).The main trouble with today’s Modernist Smorgasbord of‚religions‛ is that it is assumed that experience and not truthis principal thing in knowing God. But this is a spiritual andepistemological confusion of the ‚subject‛ with the ‚Object.‛

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality I. It is The Truth-Claims of God’s Revelation and Not the Worshipper’s Ritual and Journey That is Central.  Question: Why do many moderns reject the Biblical Jewish and Christian Creator and Redeemer ? Why is He so ‚offensive‛ to the modernist sense of ‚spirituality‛ ? (Cf. Paul Copan text, pp. 64 -65).

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityII. The Irony of the Pluralistic Modernist Religious Spectrum is Their Extreme Inclusiveness for All Religions Except for Orthodox Christianity. Question: Can you state Newton’s Third Law as it applies to Exclusivist belief claims/affirmations ? (Cf. p. 65, pg. 2).

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The Religion of Your Choice : Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityIII. The Place of Jesus? He is Supreme and, Incidentally This Universe is His Place !5 We cannot affirm conflicting belief systems as all true, without committing mental torture and sheer logical contradiction. And Christianity is uniquely about God saving man, not about how man saved or kept God – it is all about God’s grace, how Christ rescues man !5Cf. Darrell Bock, Preface in Robert Bowman Jr. and Ed Komoszewski, Putting Jesus inHis Place (Grand Rapids, MI.: Kregel Publishing Company, 2007), p. 17.

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive SpiritualityIV. C. S. Lewis, a believing Christian apologist at Oxford University, many years ago warned people about false religion and false ideas of faith. In his famous satire, The Screwtape Letters, he has an elderly and veteran demon admonishing a younger rookie apprentice (i.e., Wormwood) about the most effective way to destroy ‚religiously inclined‛ humans: [ See the Next Slide >>>>>>>> ]

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality Quote from Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters: ‚ Your man has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to having a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing together inside his head. He doesn’t think of doctrines as primarily ‚true‛ or ‚false,‛ but as ‚academic‛ or ‚practical,‛ ‚outworn‛ or ‚contemporary,‛ ‚conventional‛ or ‚ruthless.‛ Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church.‛ 66The Screwtape Letters (New York and London: Macmillian, 1982), p. 8.

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality 3. Summary of Key Points:  1. Biblical Theism is not neutral about religion or other ‚gods‛ (Cf. [7] William Wainright, ed., God, Philosophy, and Academic Culture (Atlanta, GA.: Scholars Press, 1996 ). ( Copan, p. 65) 2. Building our own religion by preference rather than by truth/consistency puts us out of touch with reality. ( Copan, p. 65). 3. Truth-claims are commonly ignored in academia because they ‛exclude‛ people who disagree. [ Continued on the Next Slide ]: (pp. 65 -66)

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality 3. [Continued]: The commonalities of religious experience are emphasized instead. (Paul Copan, pp. 66). 4. Finally, creating God in your own image may seem safe, but in actuality, it is soul-destroying. By contrast, the God of the Bible, though [infinitely!] good, is not supposed to be safe. ( Paul Copan, Ibid.) [ But if you are joined with Him by faith, you are eternally safe – John 10:26-30 and Romans 8:31-39).

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The Religion of Your Choice :Modernist Smorgasbord of Inclusive Spirituality Further Reading: See these Books: